Flat Heroes – Review

Flat Heroes has you playing as a square, dodging incoming projectiles throughout over 300 levels. Whilst this game may seem a little one-dimensional (pun absolutely intended), does it have enough under the surface to be regarded as a great game?

Gameplay

The objective of Flat Heroes is to jump and avoid any oncoming projectiles by moving around each level’s unique layout. Flat Heroes boasts a variety of various challenges, so don’t think that it’s going to be the same thing over and over.

As well as move and jump, you can also dash, wall jump, and even stick to walls and sides in order to avoid oncoming projectiles. This gives another level of options to a game that is admittedly lacking in depth.

Up to four-player local co-op is available to play alongside friends and family. Co-op is by far the best way to play the game as not only does it put less stress on a single player to beat each level, but it also creates a lot of yelling and some funny deaths.

As the levels progress, they become increasingly difficult. That being said, the level quickly restarts so that you aren’t waiting around each time. This allows you to beat a level through trial and error, remembering the patterns and allowing you to formulate strategies.

There are boss fights at the end of each world, but don’t expect too much from them. They are merely just dodging an entity that keeps coming after you until you they run out of lines.

Flat Heroes has some truly difficult levels towards the latter portion of the game. If you get truly stuck and cannot beat a level, you are able to skip it and proceed through the game.

After you complete World 3, you’ll unlock Survival mode that features a whole range of challenges that consist of the player lasting as long as possible, and comparing scores on a worldwide leaderboard. Also after you complete World 4, you’ll unlock a Heroes Mode (which is another way of saying a Hard Mode).

Despite the twenty worlds and survival modes, Flat Heroes still is quite straightforward in its gameplay. It remains similar and unsurprising, and can become tedious when playing solo in longer play sessions.

Level Design

The levels may seem overly simplistic at first, but they soon become incredibly hectic requiring the player to think ahead. Both normal and hard modes contain ten worlds, each with 15 levels in them. These levels are designed to be quick and simple to play, a perfect fit for on-the-go play on the Nintendo Switch.

There is some mild variety in terms of level design, with varying size boxes and the challenges within them. Flat Heroes tends to mix these up quite well, doing as much as it can to keep things fresh.

Flat Heroes does a great job at introducing the player to new mechanics. It doesn’t bore you with tedious tutorial boxes; rather it has you learning by doing.

Graphics / Art Style

Flat Heroes has a very minimalistic art style, which is part of the charm. Being able to so clearly distinguish between colors (and being able to change the color-pallet to the player’s liking by unlocking them as you go) keeps the gameplay honest and fair.

Speaking as someone who is red-green colorblind, I had absolutely no issue differentiating between colors as the game allowed me to choose a color-pallet that worked for me.

Music / Sound Design

The music in Flat Heroes is an upbeat dance style that is made to be adrenaline pumping. It mixes up its tracks so as to not become too repetitive, but the tempo rarely changes; we hope you like dance music, because you’ll be hearing a lot of it.

The use of music and sound is cleverly implemented in certain levels, aiding the player in more than just visual cues.

Final Score 75%

You can probably tell from the art style, but what you see with Flat Heroes is what you get. While there are boss fights at the end of every world, Flat Heroes is simply a game to play in order to kill some time. There is no story or characters, it simply exists for the sake of being a video game. Whilst some may think that $9.99 is a bit steep on first glance, Flat Heroes packs enough content to warrant the price. However, do not expect anything in depth with this one. On the bright side, if you’re not in the mood for a story and just want to play some mindless fun, then Flat Heroes might just be what you’re looking for.

Will you be picking up Flat Heroes on Switch? Let us know in the Comments section below.